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News Roundup, Week of September 9

Here are a few news articles worth taking note of for the week of September 9th.

29 killed and 4 missing in landslides and flooding in Vietnam

Heavy rains and flooding continue to take a toll on the people and land in Vietnam. As of Monday, 29 people have been killed and 4 have gone missing following landslides in Vietnam’s northern provinces. The storms and floods have also resulted in $22 million worth of damages in rice crops and infrastructure.

Vietnam Agent Orange Victims Get Scientology Treatment

(This story actually came out last week.) Following the start of the U.S. government’s commitment to removing Agent Orange toxins at the Da Nang airport, the Vietnamese government has also announced a new measure to help victims detox. The government has began implementing a detox methodology championed by the Association for Better Living and Education, an organization sponsored by the Church of Scientology. This method involves taking vitamins and minerals and sweating through strenuous activity. Some firefighters in New York were also given this treatment following the September 11 tragedy in 2001. However, some experts question this method’s efficacy. Speaking to the New York Times, Dr. Marcella L. Warner of the University of California at Berkeley said that sweating and exercise alone is unlikely to remove a toxin that contaminates the blood. “I would not expect that it would lower the body burden of dioxin in a given person,” she said.

Will Vietnam Become SE Asia’s Greece?

Vietnam’s financial sector has been very turbulent these past few weeks, with concerns that Vietnam may be in need of a large bailout from the International Monetary Fund (although Vietnam’s central bank has denied that it will seek a loan, for the time being). This attention-grabbing headline from The Diplomat writer Luke Hunt provides a brief analysis of what’s ailing Vietnam’s finances. “Housing prices have halved, foreign investment is down by a third and forecast growth rates of five percent over the next two years are paltry for a developing country out to improve its lot,” he writes.

Photo by EU Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection via Flickr (Creative Commons)

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